


One Night Only

by Major



Category: Grey's Anatomy
Genre: Crushes, Denial of Feelings, Humor, M/M, Oblivious Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-18
Updated: 2018-10-18
Packaged: 2019-08-04 02:06:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16337705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Major/pseuds/Major
Summary: Schmitt and Nico spend the night together.Um. Sort of.





	One Night Only

**Author's Note:**

> I love this time of year and thought I'd write something in the spirit of the season.

The fall festival was full of people from work.  Half of all proceeds were going to the hospital, and Schmitt pretended that was the reason he was so enthusiastic about going.  He refrained from wearing a costume (though, mostly because he was still debating between Spider-Man and Venom), which was the best compromise he was willing to make with Helm on the way over.

There were booths set up with games and concessions.  The carnival rides were kids-only (bummer), but there were plenty of games to keep him wide-eyed and bouncing around.  Some of that bouncing was sugar-fueled (Parker cut him off midway through his cotton candy stick, warning him not to operate heavy machinery or mix that high with alcohol), but he was mostly just happy to be there.

Orange, green, and purple lights stood out in stark contrast to the darkening sky as they brightened the festival in strings wound around posts and bulbs fixed to the top of booths.  Laughter and the wafting smell of pumpkin pie filled the air and eased the tension from a hard week.  A break from work was what he needed.

Schmitt remembered to take off his jacket but was so used to the sports band now that he’d left his glasses on.  As a result, he fished an apple out between his teeth on the fourth bob—victory!—but was blinded by water droplets as he snapped back upright out of the big plastic bowl.  There was some celebratory garbling, made incoherent by his excitement and the fruit lodged in his mouth, but Helm and Parker cheered and pat him on the back.  He may have stepped on Hunt’s foot during a patient examination and knocked over a tray today, but he apparently rocked at bobbing for apples.  He’d take his triumphs where he could.

Possibly less of one, was blinking enough to see that Dr. Kim was standing across from the table with his hands deep in the pockets of his hoodie and a smile on his face.  Schmitt dropped the apple into his hand and tried not to choke on the piece he’d bitten off in his rush to remove it.  It was a short coughing fit, at least.

“I caught an apple,” he said.

It was as stupid as it sounded coming out, because Link, leaving Dr. Kim’s side, grinned and shoved Schmitt over with his elbow as he said, “It’s not deep sea fishing, dude.”

A few of the nurses on staff were suddenly more interested in the bobbing for apples table, and Schmitt stepped aside to leave Link to his admirers.

“Very impressive,” Nico said.

Not really, and it became not really-er when Link splashed back up out of the bowl on his first bob after only a few seconds with an apple clenched between his teeth.  His shook his head and water sprinkled out from his long locks like a lion showing off for his pride.  He tossed the apple to one of the nurses and resubmerged for another quick capture.

After his third successfully bobbed apple, Schmitt frowned.  “Now that’s just showing off.”

Nico nodded.  “I prefer a more modest apple pillager.”

Schmitt wiped his glasses dry and thought Nico was an impressive sight even half-blind.  He saw him out of scrubs often enough before or after changing or over at Joe’s, but there was an odd catch to his thoughts when he saw him in a pair of jeans or a long-sleeved shirt, like the gears in his mind stuttered.  He had to concentrate to get them working again.  Glasses back on, the effect intensified.  It was somewhere left of intimidation, south of fear—settled into a flutter in the pit of his stomach.

“Schmitt!”  Helm pointed over to the other side of the festival.  “Let’s check out the patch.”

She and Parker lingered to wait for him as they started to wander from the booth, and Schmitt looked from the huge pumpkin patch where people were picking one out to buy and either paint or carve at the tables, to Nico and hesitated.

Nico caught on and was a much quicker thinker.  “I haven’t checked out the back of the festival yet,” he hinted.

“Me neither.”

“You wanna…?”

“Yeah.  Yeah, let’s go.  Check it out.”  Relieved to have a reason to stay behind that was better than _I feel drawn to this guy and want to hang out with him without explaining to anyone or asking myself why_ , Schmitt called to his friends, “I’ll catch up with you guys!”

Parker waved easily, but there was a slight hesitation from Helm when her gaze moved between him and Nico that made him feel like he’d walked out of the shower without a towel.  Whatever exposure he felt, the moment turned over and she waved before walking off with Parker.

The back of the festival was packed with more booths.  Sweet smells of pastries and candy wafted through the crowd they weaved through until stopping at a sign near the edge of the trees.

**Haunted Hayride:  
One Night Only**

Schmitt wouldn’t call himself a chicken.  Mostly because the self-help book with affirmations that was half-read on his nightstand suggested positive spins on negative situations since he was, in fact, a bit of a wimp.  Or as Be Your Best Self! would have preferred: being in possession of only a very small amount of bravery was simply an opportunity for personal growth.

“What do you think?” Nico asked.  “You up for it?”

There was a costume contest and a booth where you could win a giant stuffed candy corn back in the festival, both haunt free, but Schmitt was a fully grown man and perfectly capable of (pretending) not to be scared.

“Let’s do it.”  What was one more thing on a long list of regrettable choices?

“Cool.”

They got in line.  Unfortunately, it was a short one.  A truck pulled up with an open wagon hitched to the back.  Bales of hay peppered the bench seats along the perimeter.  He did this kind of thing as a kid.  Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.  They were at the end of their group.  Schmitt climbed up behind everyone else.  Well, tried.  He overestimated his ability to accomplish the basic human feat of stepping upwards, slipped with his foot on the edge and tumbled sideways against the back as his foot came back down.

Nico caught him before his amazing display of _no_ balance could knock him over to the ground.  A group of kids already seated giggled at his expense in capes and face paint.  Their mother hushed them, but Schmitt figured they were within their rights to laugh at a festival when a clown was around.

“Maybe I should take the edge seat,” Nico suggested.  He reached down a hand and hauled Schmitt up into the wagon.

Frequent embarrassment provided the upside of not being weighed down with an ego or hesitating based on pride.  That was what Schmitt told himself as he sat down and let Nico sit on the end of the bench so he wouldn’t tumble out and go rolling down the road behind the truck.  He was being his best self was all.

The wagon rumbled to a slow start and pulled onto a path in the woods.  The kid sitting on Schmitt’s other side beamed up at him, face painted like a skeleton.  The kid sitting across from him shot him an open mouth grin with a pair of plastic glow-in-the-dark vampire teeth.  Where there was a kid in vamp costume, there was sure to be a bottle of fake blood nearby.  Schmitt’s eyes darted away with a cringe.

“What’s up, are you cold?” Nico asked.

He was, actually, even if that cringe was one of premeditated disgust and not a chill.  He refrained from slapping his own forehead, though his forehead deserved it, as he realized that he forgot his jacket at the apple bobbing booth.  His bare arms were under assault from the night air blowing against him as the wagon cruised through the trees, but his eyes widened in something akin to alarm when Nico started taking off his jacket to give to him.

“Oh!  No.  That’s okay,” he protested.  “Then you’ll be cold.”

More importantly, guys didn’t offer other guys their jackets.  He was pretty sure Roy would have watched him freeze with a giant grin on his face if he were there.  That was what friends did.  They laughed in the face of the threat of hypothermia.  But Nico held the jacket out to him.

“It’s cool, dude.  Long sleeves.”

Schmitt hesitated.

Slowly, he took it—uncomfortable, grateful.  Confused. Inexplicably happy by the gesture.

“Thank you,” he said as he pushed his arms through the sleeves and tried to close it.

“The zipper catches.  Here,” Nico said and reached over to zip it up for him.  Schmitt watched his hands: brilliant hands, far more adept and advanced at healing and saving lives than his own; hands with dexterous fingers and blunt nails; firm and strong and careful.  He zipped it up to his chest and smiled.  “Better?”

Warmth spread through him from the inside out, and sure, the jacket had a little to do with it.

“Yep.  Thank you.”

“Sure.”

Schmitt was very glad not to be in the seat at the edge.  Even with the tailgate up, he was sure that kind-eyed, sweet smile would have bowled him over the side.

The kid next to him gasped loudly and sent Schmitt flinching into Nico’s side.  He caught sight of what frightened her and made a far less dignified noise.  Hanging from a low-hanging branch that the wagon was passing was a massive football-sized spider.  Rubber, undoubtedly, but the primal survival instincts in him disregarded logic for horror.

Nico laughed as other squeals from the younger members of the crowd went sharp through the night as the spider bobbed past.  Rubber or not, Schmitt kept an eye on it as it was left behind, strung up in its fake, cotton-spun web.

“I’m not sure my mom would have been able to scoop that one up in a bowl and take it outside.  She does the spider patrol at home.  I’m useless with spiders.”  That was a bad opening to leave someone.  Schmitt braced himself for the _useless in general_ comment, but the joke didn’t come.

“I’m great with spiders,” Nico said instead.  “I’d probably need a swimming pool to scoop that guy out with, but I’d save you from it.”

If that Godzilla spider was real, he wasn’t sure there was a force on the planet that could save him, but he didn’t mind the image of Nico swooping in to save him at all.

“You sound like a good person to have around.”

He was suddenly very aware of how close they were sitting pressed up against each other on the tightly packed bench when Nico murmured, “You should have me around more.  Find out.”

The truck hit a bump and Nico braced himself with his arms across the side of the wagon.  His arm lingered, stretched out behind Schmitt as the path evened back out.  Schmitt watched him in profile as he looked up at the other ghouls and scares that the ride operators had set up for the hayride.  Ghosts made out of sheets swung across the top of the wagon from treetop to treetop on clothesline wires.  Witches cackled maniacally from speakers hidden in shrubs along the darkened sides.  A fog machine obscured the view of the ground.

Schmitt might have been a wimp with a very small, very limited amount of bravery, but…

Nico caught his eye, and when his hand turned along the side of the wagon to curl around Schmitt’s shoulder—heart jumping, gaze flicking to the soft curve of his lips—he didn’t pull away.

...He was working on it.


End file.
